Eternity
by natural spring water
Summary: [PostAC][CloudTifa] I hang on to your every word as if they are a lifeline, follow every little action as if they are my salvation, and I cannot help but wonder, even when you are right beside me, why there is still an eternity separating us.


**[ Disclaimer -- **I do not own Final Fantasy VII or any of its characters.

**[ Summary -- **I watch you, observe you, take in as much as I possibly can; I hang on to your every word as if they are a lifeline, follow every little action as if they are my salvation, and I cannot help but wonder, even when you are right beside me, why there is still an eternity separating us.

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**Eternity **

**by natural spring water**

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I do not remember a day that has passed without a single doubt niggling at the back of my mind, a particular insecurity overtaking my thoughts, a certain fear clawing at my insides. What if you do not come home today? What if you have encountered something that you cannot overcome on your way back? What if you have finally realized it is time to stop pretending that you care for us and never return?

And so I ask, is it so selfish of me? To love you, to long for you, and wish for my feelings to be reciprocated? To wake up every morning with you in my heart, and to sleep every night with you in my dreams? Although I must insist, with the risk of sounding conceited, that to expect nothing back, to keep these emotions to myself, implies a certain degree of selflessness. Yet you cannot know – oh, you simply cannot know – how I yearn for the day when you will look at me not with indifference and solemnity, but with tenderness, without the chains that bind you to your past, without the demons that haunt your sleep, without the memories that surround your every waking moment.

And thus I watch you. Every opportunity I get, I observe you, take in as much of you as I possibly can. I know that it is all you can give me, but I do not understand. I hang on to your every word (which are few) as if they are a lifeline, follow every little action (even fewer) as if they are my salvation. Still, still, I do not comprehend. But it is all that you can give me, and I take with greed and hunger. Like a starving man offered his last plate of food.

And I cannot help but wonder, even when you are right beside me, so close that I can feel the warmth radiating from you, so close that I can hardly resist the urge to reach out for you. . . I wonder why, even then, why why _why_ there is still an eternity separating us.

And perhaps the answer is not as elusive as I insist it must be. Perhaps it has always been in front of us, but I've refused to acknowledge it, refused to give up hope.

But now . . . now I realize that you are broken, and I cannot heal you.

It should not have hurt this much, this epiphany. I should have been of a mind with those who believe that if you love someone, you must let them go. I should have hoped that you will one day mend, even without me. But I didn't. Mine is a selfish heart. And I know that it is not being fanciful when it proclaims that I will love you until the day I die.

It is unfair, this burden that rests upon your shoulders. Sometimes I wish your mind, your heart, your soul will just leave you be. Why must you torture yourself everyday? It has been two years. Please let it go. You cannot alter things that have already come into fruition. Believe me, I would have done so long ago if it were possible. To save you from all this suffering. To save you from yourself.

It is unbelievable how aware I am of your presence when you enter the house, your boots silent on the tiled kitchen floor. A surge of happiness – the one that always comes with your every return back to this home, _our _home – floods my senses, and it is almost futile to do anything else but consume you with my eyes, almost futile to resist the inclination to touch you, to make sure you are real.

What a bother it is, this eternity that separates us. And how utterly frustrating that you are the only one able to overcome it, yet you clearly do not desire to do so.

I suppose I should be content with the fact that you value me as a friend, honored even. I should be content with the fact that you are comfortable to go so far as to live with me, and that is closer than anyone else can possibly get. But I will admit once more that I am not a saint, not as pure of heart as she was, and I love you, and I want to share my life with you.

The pain is more intense than usual this night. The knowledge that I can be this close to you but never have you kills a little part of me everyday. But tonight, for some inexplicable reason, the pain is tenfold. And maybe this is what prompts me to reach out blindly and wrap my arms around you. You freeze instantly, but your heat warms me, and the feel of your unsteady breath against my skin is enough to drive any other semblance of propriety out of my mind. I never, ever want to let you go.

"Tifa?" you ask in a hoarse voice, as if it had been left unused for too long. I hold on to you more desperately, fearing rejection, anticipating a look of disgust on your face, and when you lift tentative hands to encircle me I lean more firmly against you, and your strength encompasses me. I do not think you realize that, had you pushed me away, I would have shattered into a million little pieces.

"Save me, Cloud," I whisper into the crook of your neck, and once again you are alert, ready for something to jump out at you from the shadows even though there is nothing there – nothing else accompanies us in this room but my misery, and that hangs so heavily in the air it is a wonder you cannot see it. My words make little sense – I hesitate to breathe in your arms, let alone think – and as your grip tightens around me, worried by what I've said, happiness and sadness collide in my heart and merge so cunningly that it is hard to distinguish which is which.

"Is someone watching us right now, Tifa? Have they hurt you?" The concern is evident in your voice, and I could have sworn that right then and there, my love for you doubled. But then again, I like to think that my love is equal to eternity – and if you double eternity, it is still the same quantity, is it not? It's just . . . oh, merciful heavens, if this is as close as I can get to the illusion of your love, then I don't think I'd have it in me to let you go. It will be too painful.

I feel your confusion and your awkwardness even as I lay motionless before you, and then you gently pull me away, and I clutch on to you a moment – oh, please, just give me one more moment – longer. You look at me closely, trying to read my thoughts, and I do not think you noticed, but anxiety filled your otherwise emotionless eyes.

Sometimes the question of why you still bother to survive in this lifetime burns in my mind, cruel as it may sound, why you still keep moving forward when it is obvious you had no more insight to look forward to the promise of tomorrow. You are nothing more than a hollow shell of a man – nonexistent if not for the people who surround and care for you – you are nothing more than a shadow of what has once been a great person, a legend, a shadow of my hero. And on the rare occasion that I see a glimmer of something close to resembling life in your eyes, regret fills every inch, every corner, and every crevice of my soul, regret so intense it is almost a physical pain. I think he is still somewhere inside of you – I think my Cloud is still somewhere inside of you, and I cannot suppress the anger that stems from your refusal to allow that old Cloud, my Cloud, to resurface.

And this raises the issue of whether it is really this shell of you that I love, or the old Cloud. Is it your memory that I cherish and adore? Is my insistence that my love for you is whole-hearted and steadfast merely the result of a woman's loneliness and longing for someone that isn't there anymore? Is my love for the old Cloud so blind that I let myself ignore the fact that the chances of this relationship ever working out is close to nothing?

But every now and then I catch the flickers of emotion in your eyes, and there is nothing I can do but hope, hope that somewhere inside you my Cloud still lives, that someday he will come back to me as he promised. And then I remember all the things we've been through – the Geostigma, the creation of our unconventional family – and think that maybe, just maybe, you are not so different from my Cloud as you let others believe.

You are beautiful in the moonlight, with your eyes almost flashing silver, reflecting the light, and your skin hot under my fingertips as I graze the strong line of your jaw with my hands, unconsciously. And it is as if I am watching from the outside of my own body – knowing what I am going to do next but refusing to believe that I actually have the nerve to do it – when I stand at my full height.

My lips touch yours in the lightest of caresses, and I wonder if you feel all the emotions I am trying to convey in this one gesture – joy and sadness, anguish and elation. You are bitter and sweet and unrelenting and soft all at the same time, and it lasts an eternity but ends all too soon. You stiffen and my previously lost inhibitions come crashing down on me. The weight of what I have done repeats itself over and over in my mind.

Regret is followed quickly by distress. This changes everything, doesn't it? Oh, I should have been content with the friendship you have given me freely. I knew it is more than other people would have dared to hope for. But foolish, selfish girl that I am, I had to go and ruin it. I rush to make amends.

"Cloud, I-I'm so sorry," But even as I say it, I remember the feel of your lips against mine, feel even then the pleasant burning sensation on my skin, and you must have known how insincere the apology is. The kiss makes me unbalanced, renders me temporarily incapable of rational thought, but not even I am so flustered as to be completely ignorant of the monumental consequences of my actions. A thousand possible outcomes flash behind my eyes, each one resolutely worse than the last, ending with the conclusion that you will decide to leave me and the children for good, and tears come unbidden to my eyes, and my throat closes up as I try to push more words past it, to stall for time, anything to keep you with me for as long as possible. "Please, _please_ let me expl-"

And my eyes are open wide, and this cannot be happening, and _oh_, this must be a dream, because all of a sudden there is no more distance between us – not an inch and definitely not an eternity – and you are so close I can no longer tell where my skin ends and where yours begins. It takes me a second to make sense of what is going on, another second to realize that your lips – gentle and coaxing – are upon mine, and another second to know that I am in the circle of your arms once more.

"Oh, Cloud," I whimper against your mouth, and that is all the encouragement you need to deepen the kiss, and I become no more than a mass of boneless flesh against you. I taste you and I smell you and I feel you, all masculinity and strength, and as your hands sweep blazing trails across my back and down the length of my arms, electricity races across my skin, pleasure erupts in every nerve.

And it is a marvel how comforting you are beneath my touch, the security I felt from the solidity of your body, stable even as my knees wobble and my whole weight sags against you. Amazing how the muscles that ripple and shift across your back and in the arms that hold me so steadily contrast so sharply with the feathery softness of your hair, made coarse by the irregularity of the locks. Wonderful how you kiss me with ferocity and hunger one second – as if you have been waiting for this for a long time – and the next with deliberate slowness and reverence – as if you know we have a lifetime before us to do whatever we'd always wanted to. But most of all, it is heavenly how perfectly we complement each other: where I am supple you are sturdy, where I am unstable you are unyielding, where I am unharnessed energy you are the epitome of control, where I am fire you are ice.

I break away only when my lungs are all but screaming for oxygen, and even then with great reluctance, afraid that you will vanish. As I fight for my breath, my eyes search yours beseechingly, and all I can see is the faintest hint of mirth in your eyes even as you lips are pressed tightly in a straight line. And as I open my mouth to voice my thoughts, and as you silence me with another kiss, it is then that I finally know that the eternity that has separated us now lay ahead of us, an eternity made sweet with the promise of happiness and love.

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**[ Author's Note --** Any grammatical or spelling errors? Please let me know. Oh, and your thoughts will be greatly appreciated! Thank you for reading.


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